Two things beckoned me: a bottle of vodka I’d found stashed away in the back of a cupboard, and the smoking gun in the cellar—the cage. Landing on the bottom step, I glanced around the empty living room.

Jax hadn’t been back since I’d caught him with Nikki, and I hadn’t stuck around to hear their explanations.

Absently, I grabbed the stashed vodka, unscrewed the lid, and took a drink straight from the bottle. Darkness blanketed the cabin, as not a single bulb highlighted the shadows. I didn’t feel inclined to turn on a lamp. The darkness called to me, the unassuming companionship it offered. Quiet solitude didn’t pester me about my state of mind like my brother’s phone calls did. It didn’t ask if I remembered anything. But it also didn’t tell me shit. That damn cage in the cellar might, if I could only force my brain to cooperate.

I swayed for an instant and did a double take at the bottle. Who knew vodka could go down so well. As I stumbled a path to the cellar door, I kicked myself for turning to alcohol. Booze only numbed the problem temporarily, and it turned smart people into fucked up stupid people. I pulled the door open and took an unsteady jaunt down the stairs, then came to a stop in front of the evidence I wanted so badly to deny.

Maybe you should take a peek in the cellar.

Jax’s words from last week echoed through the space between my ears. I stared at the cage, my mind trapped inside, a prisoner to the unknown as I willed it to impart the things my brain refused to remember.

When Jax told me about my eight-year prison sentence, I’d had a difficult time believing him. When he’d told me about Alex’s accusation, that had been even harder to accept. But the bigger part of myself, the part that was still stuck in the past by eight years, was horrified by what he claimed I’d done. To Alex.

I still remembered her as this too-tempting not-so-innocent girl that liked to play with my head. Alex and her jade come-hither gaze that never failed to burrow beneath my skin like a first degree burn. Constantly flirting, teasing, driving me fucked up crazy.